MPP Dunlop unsure if he’ll run again

Garfield Dunlop

NORTH SIMCOE – Were a provincial election called tomorrow, Garfield Dunlop would run again as the local Progressive Conservative candidate.

If the next election is in 2015, however, the longtime MPP said there’s a chance he might step aside.

“It will all depend on Jane,” Dunlop said of his wife, a Severn Township councillor. “If Jane wants me to not run again, I would definitely be with her. If I want to run and she supports me, then I would.”

Dunlop, now in his fourth term, was nominated as the local candidate a year ago in preparation for a possible election.

“I’m ready to go, whenever it is,” he said. “But this thing could go on until the end of the term. If the government is propped up by somebody, it could go right through to 2015 and, of course, that would be another story.”

Dunlop said he has enjoyed “four good terms,” but another run is not a foregone conclusion.

“One day you are on top of the world in this business and you’re happy with everything, and the next day you get really cynical,” he said. “I’m all over the map on that.

“I’m already 14 years,” he added. “At the end of this term, if it went right through, it would be 16 1/2 years. If you did get into a situation where you had an election and you won a majority, that means you’re there 20 years. You’ve got to weight all that out.”

The job requires considerable stamina, he said: “If I got sick or I was very weak and had a hard time doing the job, I think I’d have to say, ‘No, I wouldn’t do it anymore.’”

It appears Dunlop won’t have to run anytime soon, given the NDP’s conditional support for last week’s throne speech outlining the minority Liberal government’s path forward under new Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne.

Tory Leader Tim Hudak said his party would vote against the speech, while NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said her party would back the government on the condition that it support changes she is seeking.

Horwath wants improved home care for seniors, reduced auto-insurance premiums, a job-subsidy program for youth, and a closing of corporate tax loopholes.

Simcoe North provincial Liberal riding association president Fred Larsen said the throne speech was about “reaching out to people,” an approach for which Wynne is well regarded.

“I thought that was a dominant theme throughout the whole speech,” he said. “Reaching out to the other parties and saying, ‘Let’s work together.’ We have an opportunity to in a number of areas, and also reaching out to municipalities, reaching out to business, reaching out to the educational community again.”

That spirit of consultation and collaboration was echoed in a call for MPPs to serve as a “conduit” for their constituents, to determine “what their needs are.”

“That strikes me as typically Kathleen,” added Larsen.

Dunlop, however, said the speech left unanswered questions over key issues, such as the economy.

“We were looking for a really strong job-creation plan, that a lot of time would have been spent on job creation, on deficit reduction, because we are going into debt at about $1.9 million an hour right now,” he added.

The government is taking a three-pronged approach with a focus on fiscal responsibility, deficit reduction and “doing whatever needs to be done to try to create more opportunity for jobs,” Larsen said.

He added he hopes the opposition parties answer the call for co-operation.